Money market funds abandoned Europe in the spring of 2011. The fact that the money is returning, like green shoots after a forest fire, is a sign of growing confidence that a major meltdown has been avoided.

Here are two numbers to know about the United States and Japan: 1.79 percent and 0.77 percent. In other words, investors are willing to fling their savings at those two seemingly dysfunctional governments for next to nothing.

Congress and the White House have already agreed to $1.5 trillion in deficit reduction that will leave key domestic programs—from veterans health care to Head Start—facing a $615 billion shortfall over the next 10 years, according to a new analysis.